If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

Taming Squiggles?

I have 5 parakeets- Cobalt and Kiwi who come together, Dawn and Mangoe who came together, and Squiggles. What happen was I rescuded Cobalt and Kiwi because they were being neglected (they're cage was literally 1 foot by 1 foot, I use it as a travel cage now) and then adopted Squiggles because they were depressed and I thought they would like a buddy. Only one problem, they ignored Squiggles and soon she became downtrodden to. So I took on Dawn and Mangoe. Now, luckily, all my birdies are happy. Except Kiwi, she's very shy and timid.

Cobalt is the only male, and the rest are female. Sometimes they bicker, but overall they are pretty good. I want to help Kiwi overcome her shyness, and the only way I can think of doing that is to train her. But I would have to remove her from the flock to do that, and I think it would be worse for her to take her away from Cobalt. Before I got my other birds she would literally follow his every move... she is very insecure.

And now Squiggles in kind of moving in on Cobalt lol. Squiggles was tame before I got her, but we had an episode where she accidently tore out her primary feathers on one wing because she was fluttering around in a smaller cage so much. My mom, being uneducated on birds, caught Squiggles with her bare hands. So on top of the stress of being in a new environment, she now had her trust in humans ruined.

I want to tame Squiggles, because she is a very social bird but the other pairs don't really want to accept her. I think if she bonded with me, Kiwi might get closer to Cobalt and become less shy. And......I want at least one of my birds to be tame.

So! I have a smaller cage that is appropraite for one bird, but my question is this.....Should I put Squiggles in another room, or just the opposite part of my room? A place where she can't see the other birds maybe? Just hear them? The only problem is their cage is open almost all day, so she could still see if they flew around.

I don't really want to move her to another part of the house, but I will if it comes to that. My room is very bird safe, and as I said, I keep the cage open all day (even though they have a flight cage) so they have free range of my room. Usually they just sit on top of the cage, though.

Re: Taming Squiggles?

Whew! No wonder you haven't gotten a reply so far ... from your essay it is a bit difficult to figure out what you are asking. You have definitely made a series of assumptions based on the behavior you have observed when you were present. How much time do you spend with your budgies? I'm afraid that the only thing I can tell you right now is to step back from your desires and let the birds live! It sounds like there is still a lot of stress the birds are exposed to, give them time, you might surprise yourself how friendly they all become with each other. A couple of months can make a huge difference. Singling Squiggles out would certainly do her more harm than good. In my experience, a bird that was tamed once will remember the training even after several months. Letting her go any way she wants right now might be the cure for all the birds. Human intervention in bird behavior has to be very well managed and approached very carefully.